Book Description
Decorating is about being creative-being bold, taking a risk, trying something new. There's no right or wrong, only what works for you and your home.
Decorating Idea Book is filled with over 500 approachable ideas for every room in the house. To spark your own creativity and to help you create a home that reflects your personality, you'll find information on everything from room arrangements and furniture placement to choosing the right window treatments and showcasing treasured collectibles. From the floor to the ceiling and every space in between, Decorating Idea Book is your guide to creating a home that you love more and more every time you walk through the front door. "Fabulous. It works like a reference manual for homeowners and professionals alike."
--Lynette Jennings, creator and host of Lynnette Jennings Design
Customer Reviews:
Fun Ideas You Can't Keep to Yourself.......2007-08-16
There are so many ideas in this book that I've dogeared nearly every page, and my friends and coworkers will have to buy their own copies because I'm tired of lending it out!
Helps to visualize and plan!.......2007-04-12
My Decorating Idea Book has given me many ideas and good tips. It's on loan right now to a friend who just bought a house and is moving in! I will hopefully build later in the year, but I want to know what I want before I begin. This book has the information and pictures I need to help me make decisions! I like it!
A Fantastic book, covers all areas!!.......2006-07-01
I am currently pursuing a correspondence course in interior decorating and thought this book would help to augment my course materials. Well, my expectations were far exceeded, this book takes you step by step through the elements of design i.e. pattern, texture, scale,color, etc. Next, it outlines each area of home decorating with examples and suggestions, including great photos. Next, it takes you through each type of room and explains the purpose and the main considerations for decorating it. Great suggestions, examples!! I do not regret this buy.
Pictures, Yes! But Also Great Description of What You See.......2006-01-11
I've never understood how people could look at a room, then look at the thousands of items available for sale at everywhere from thrift shops and Wal-Mart to the expensive Antique malls and put it all together in a way that makes an otherwise stark room look so much better. Then, of course, there's the little matter of color. And you mean that the color of the walls might change to reflect, or go with, or contrast with the color of the major bits of furniture -- what a concept.
This book is billed as an idea book. That is, filled with pictures that show you what can be done. And it is indeed that. But more than that, here is a description of why this particular item of furniture, why this particular color was chosen for this particular place, this particular theme.
Ms. Paper, what a name for an author, has degrees in both interior design and in jornalism. And since no photographer is credited, I presume she was also the photographer for the four or five hundred pictures in the book. She brings a great insite into explaining what she is showing in these rooms. This is a great coffee table book as well as a book of ideas of how you might want to make your home look.
A wealth of gorgeous and practical suggestions for adding that special touch of vibrancy to their personal living space.......2005-11-03
The Decorating Idea Book offers the enterprising homeowner or apartment dweller a wealth of gorgeous and practical suggestions for adding that special touch of vibrancy to their personal living space. Full-color photographs on every page showcase the themes and coordination suggestions spelled out at length by the detailed text. Packed from cover to cover with innovative ideas for color, furniture, windows, walls, floors, ceilings, lighting, and storage, the Decorating Idea Book is an ideal resource for the "do-it-yourself" inclined who eschew paying out big money to professional decorators.
Book Description
New ideas on how to design, build, and decorate a home are always of essential value to architects, designers, and homeowners alike. This book offers an extensive collection of apartments from all over the world, devised by distinguished international architects and designers who have worked to achieve practical, innovative, and stunning solutions adapted to the specific needs and particular tastes of their clients. This compilation expresses the diversity of current trends in apartment design and provides an inspirational source of ideas for those active in the field of design or interested in catching up on the latest in contemporary residential architecture.
Customer Reviews:
150 best house ideas is much better, this one is ok.......2007-05-23
150 best house ideas is much better, this one is ok
Great for Inspiration.......2007-05-12
This is a great inexpensive book to get you thinking about design ideas. There are excellent pictures and a little text to briefly describe what is happening. It would have been nice to get a more detailed description of how things are actually built... but a great book to casually look through.
Solve Your Apartment Issues.......2007-04-04
Apartment living presents decorating challenges unlike homes, and this book will show you how to get around them.
Ideas from the world's best designers.......2007-03-23
The design of an apartment presents several challanges not imposed on the designer of a free-standing house. The most restricting is probably size, and second having to deal with walls that probably can't be moved. Even more interesting or challenging is dealing with the confines of an older building that may have beams in strange places, or in one instance in this book a now abandoned water tank on the roof to be converted into a penthouse.
As you might guess from the title, this book consists almost exclusively of pictures of 150 apartments from around the world showing how some of the best architects in the world have handled the challenges presented. The apartments are not your low end Government supported housing, but top of the line units in New York, or Milan, or perhaps Melbourne. It makes this an 'idea book' suitable for any architects office.
The book itself is beautifully printed on heavy weight paper and the book has a sewn binding with headbands, features that will make it last a long time even with heavy usage.
Book Description
A revision of the architectural classic on design analysis
Precedents in Architecture, Third Edition provides a vocabulary for architectural analysis that illuminates the works of leading architects and aids architects and designers in creating their own designs.
Thirty-one leading architects are represented in this updated Third Edition in examinations of more than 100 structures assessed through a diagrammatic technique that is applicable to any structure. This impressive collection includes sixteen new buildings and eight innovative architects distinguished by the strength, quality, and interest of their designs. Readers will find valuable guidance in analyzing architectural history as an evolutionary process by exploring the commonality of design ideas reflected in a broad range of structures by internationally renowned architects.
Both novices and seasoned professionals will find Precedents in Architecture, Third Edition a very useful tool for enriching their design vocabulary and for the ongoing assessment of buildings found in today's evolving landscape.
Customer Reviews:
Excellent Book.......2007-09-21
this is a good reference book when diagraming a structure. It has many examples and we work out of it frequently in studio.
Book Description
Trimwork and molding add style and character to a room and rid it of the empty box syndrome that is common to so much modern housing. With over 900 color photographs and illustrations, 1001 Ideas for Trimwork presents molding profiles and designs to turn any style home into a showplace. Topics cover window and door casings, crown moldings, chair rails, friezes, niches, wainscoting, pillars, stair embellishments, and mantel moldings. In addition to hundreds of molding designs, the book includes scores of examples of professionally decorated rooms enhanced with trimwork and molding. Bring warmth and character to every room in the home with 1001 Ideas for Trimwork.
Customer Reviews:
1001 ideas for trimwork.......2007-07-04
the book as far as reading is concerned is very good.i bought thinking that it was furniture trimwork,but it has not gone wasted. I can steal ideas from the book for my furniture in all a very good book for people in that type of business
Ideas Galore.......2006-03-14
If you're doing trimwork but have never spent a lot of time looking at various ideas out there, this is an excellent book to get your creative mind going. There are numerous variations of trim possibilities within these pages. But the best thing for me was the pages of molding profiles showing the various types and styles of molding available. Not all of it is available in my market, but it gave me ideas for molding I could make using my tools. Overall a really good book - I keep it by my bedside and go through it regularly just to create new ideas for trimwork.
Book Description
One of the first things you do when you remodel or move into a new home is change the curtains. After all, new window treatments easily, quickly, and inexpensively transform a room. They turn an outdated room into one you want to spend time in, and they make a cold space feel warm and inviting. In the style of the best-selling Idea Books, Window Treatments Idea Book offers the latest ideas for decorating all types of windows, from standard to custom. More than 350 photos provide inspiration for all rooms in the house, from the kitchen to the bathroom, bedroom to family room and study. Recognizing that consumers also want to make easy enhancements to readily available window treatments and hardware, the inspiration is peppered with practical advice on how to quickly modify off-the-shelf window treatments and design tricks for hanging them. The breadth of information makes this book the one source homeowners need when picking out window treatments.
The authors' combined years of experience have allowed them to select photos of the most popular window treatment styles as well as to provide ideas for dealing with challenging windows--bays, bows, and the like. Unique features of the book include showing one window treatment style in three different looks and quick and easy ideas for instant style.
Whether you're looking to update an existing space or are starting from scratch in a new home or newly designed addition, you'll find all the inspiration and know-how you need to create the windows of your dreams.
Window Treatments Idea Book should be a goldmine for consumers because it shows so many styles of window treatments, particularly for large, odd-shaped, and custom windows so prevalent today, in photos. What the reader gets is a wide range of window treatments in the context of every room in the house. There is also a one-page reference in the front of the book that lists each room in the house with the page number of treatments that are shown in those room contexts.
Customer Reviews:
Great design idea source!.......2007-07-01
I am an aspiring interior decorator who has bought tons of window treatment idea books as well as countless magazines for window treatment inspiration. This book now ranks #1 among all my resources for design ideas! The pictures are gorgeous, the styles are numerous and the bonus is that not only do the pictures show great window treatment ideas, but the rooms themselves are equally stunning, giving lots of decorating ideas as well. And while this is not a how-to book, it does help you decide what type of treatmens are best for your particular window type. It also helps you decide, for example, how many pleats you should plan for a pleated valance based on your window size. The only caveat I would give is that it includes mostly traditional decor, including traditional window treatments. There are few examples of more modern, clean-lined treatments. But as my style runs mostly to traditional anyway, this does not bother me. Again, a great resource for design ideas for yourself and for your clients!
Your Window Treatment Resource.......2007-04-04
This book is full of ideas and great tips for time-saving steps when creating your new window treatments. Spectacular photography accompanies the brilliant ideas.
good idea book.......2007-02-12
I was hoping for more hands on advice, but it is a great book to get ideas for your windows, with lots of great pictures.
Great ideas, terrific photography.......2007-02-06
I first borrowed this book from our local library, and liked it so much I bought my own. The photos of window treatments in actual rooms make the styles more real than sketches of windows alone. Included are explanations of how the various styles are constructed, and also recommendations for when to use professional installation, 'store-bought' or easy 'do-it-yourself' steps. Practical advice for when to use and when not to use a particular window treatment is really valuable. Whether you like the full multi-layered luxurious treatments, or simple classic coverings, it's all here.
Superb Resource!.......2007-01-13
The treatments in your new book are fantastic! How on earth are you able to come up with such a large amount of photos that don't seem to repeat everything else out there? And I don't see a lot of treatments made from the same old patterns either. Bravo! Thank so much for a book that I can show to my clients without apology for outdated photos or chintzy styles.
Your photos are of quality treatments suitable for the best of homes!
Book Description
The Big Book of Interiors features more than 600 different design ideas covering every room in the house...and then some.
For easy reference, the chapters are divided by location in the home:
- Living Rooms
- Bedrooms
- Kitchens
- Bathrooms
- Home Offices
- Kid Rooms
- Entrances and Corridors
Each section opens with text describing the decorating challenges unique to that part of the house, followed by full-color design ideas showcasing hundreds of different solutions to outfit every size room with a range of current interior style methods.The styles featured focus on the most popular used by today's best interior designers, including New rococo, Minimalism, New Rustic, Retro and Contemporary. Photographs are accompanied by captions explaining the different approaches from each designer and architect.
Whether it's one room or an entire house, Big Book of Interiors is the ultimate reference for every homeowner ready to redecorate.
Customer Reviews:
Big Book of Interiors.......2007-07-21
Not a book I'd recommend unless you're interested in pretty much the same design reworked over and over again. More than 380 pages of ultra-modern rooms which are sterile and "office building" chic at best. No diversity at all.
Not What I Expected.......2007-04-06
I don't really like having to rate a book so low, but I think it was more because it was nothing that I expected. My husband and I are basically "flipping" our house and I thought that this book would give us some great ideas and tips designing our new rooms. However, this book is just pictures! No information on where you can even find some of the products which is probably better because only movie stars and millionaires live in the houses that were displayed along the pages. If you have the money and want to gut everything, then this book is worth buying, however, if you just need some little ideas I suggest trying a different book.
Beautiful Ideas With Some Unusual Areas.......2006-07-14
This is a great idea book of interiors done by some of the best designers in the world. It is organized by the types of room:
Halls and Staircases
Kitchens
Dining Rooms
Living Rooms
Bedrooms
Home Offices
Bathrooms
This book offers ideas in several areas that you don't normall see in such idea books. The section on staircases is fantastic. Staircases give the designer to do some really dramatic things. I didn't realize just how dramatic until I saw all the designs that are shown here. And surprisingly, many of them look like they would be less expensive than traditional designs.
Another aspect of this book that isn't often seen is the decoration they have done on smaller houses and even lofts in converted warehouses, and sometimes showing very small areas.
Don't get the feeling though that you could build rooms like these by buying your appliances and furniture at the cut-rate discount store. This is a book of high end designs. Spectacularly photographed and printed.
Book Description
Tile has been transformed in the popular imagination from a pedestrian material to a sought-after design element. Home centers, specialty tile shops, and Internet sources offer the average homeowner an amazing range of mass-produced, handmade, and custom tile types made of materials including ceramics, natural stone, metal, and glass.
Organized by room, with chapters covering kitchens, bathrooms, living spaces, entries, and mudrooms, Tile Idea Book presents hundreds of photographs showing the effects created by all the major types of tile available today when installed in different settings: large rooms, such as kitchens, and small ones, such as bathrooms and entryways. It shows how color, pattern, and texture can be used to create special effects on floors and walls and provides specific information on how to recreate these effects. Also covered is the decorative use of tile in fireplaces and hearths, wainscoting, stairs, and halls, as well as in exterior settings such as terraces and patios.
Customer Reviews:
Great book for my customers!.......2006-04-10
The Tile Idea Book by Andrew Wormer is my favorite book to show to my customers when they're struggling with what they want to do design-wise for their next tile job. We flip through the pages and get great ideas for kitchens, bathrooms -- just about any space where tile is the answer. This book was a very good investment. Grout Girl
Book Description
The kitchen is the true heart of the home, and homeowners are spending a lot of time and money to make their old kitchens less utilitarian and more creative, a place where people can congregate as well as cook and enjoy good food. And, the bathroom today is also getting more attention than ever from homeowners, as they realize its value as a personal retreat and resale enhancer. Taunton's New Kitchen and Bath Idea Book Collection includes both their New Kitchen Idea Book and New Bathroom Idea Book. Both of these wonderful idea books are brimming with visual inspiration. One beautiful photo after another will inspire readers with creative ways to solve problems and enhance the quality of each space. In addition, this collection offers lots of practical information and a wide array of design ideas that will appeal to every budget and taste.
Customer Reviews:
Great source of inspiration!.......2007-08-02
My husband and I are turning our uninspired 1968 tract home into a 2 story Mediterranean. We bought the Kitchen & Bath collection to help us in the design phase. These are not "do it yourself" books. Instead, they help you focus on how to design a kitchen or bath that will work for you. They discuss types of flooring, counters, cabinets, lighting, and how to design a space that "works" for your lifestyle and that "flows" well within your floorplan. We have lots of other books with lots of pretty pictures of designer kitchens & baths but these books were the most useful when we finally sat down with our architect. Without them, we would have never thought to include a lot of the little touches that helped to maximize our kitchen space for the way we cook (canning, cake decorating, candy making, entertaining) or how to make the best use of our bathroom space (extra storage and accessibility) since I have a disability. You might think that your architect would help you with all these things but don't count on it. The clearer your ideas are and the better you are able to articulate those ideas to your architect, the better your design is going to fit your lifestyle and the happier you will be when the project is finished.
Book Description
Colonial is one of the most beautiful and enduring home styles, with a rich past and numerous offshoots including Georgian, Dutch Colonial, Adams style, and even Colonial Revival. This thorough guide combines outstanding designs and proven ideas for redoing an existing Colonial or building a new one. Featuring over 20 case studies of updated homes and Colonials built from scratch, the book is filled with hundreds of inspiring original color photographs and before-and-after plans.
Customer Reviews:
Great book.......2007-06-22
I think this book was exactly what we were looking for. We were creating a new front entrance, adding a garage and great room and we also resided and replaced the roof. We found plenty of great pictures that captured the style of colonial homes. I think all the ideas and pictures in this book were perfect, adding the class and style of today but with keeping the old character of this time period. Great for a coffee table book too!
"This is not your father's colonial".......2007-01-25
The author, Matthew Schoenherr, is an architect who not only admires the colonial style, he has a lot of experience with remodels, renovations and new construction. There are lots of photos, floor plans, diagrams, and useful text in this book. He covers all the basics about what makes a home a colonial. There are explanations of various styles of roofs, windows, doors, chimneys, moldings, and other details that make a house "colonial."
What is kind of odd about this book is how few of the homes end up looking really colonial after the work is finished - especially the interiors. Most of the photos show rooms with lofty and/or vaulted ceilings, banks of windows, curved doorway arches, and other stylistic anomalies. Apparently his clients like the "idea" of a colonial style home but they want a very contemporary interior. The rooms are beautiful, but they tend to look like "Martha Washington meets Judy Jetson in Tuscany" more than they resemble anything I've seen in Williamsburg, VA. This is something that goes beyond having a colonial home with a multi car garage, large bathrooms, and a spacious kitchen. Schoenherr refers to this as blending colonial design with modernism.
The book is very logically laid out. (Well, he is an architect!)
Chapter 1 discusses the history of the colonial home in America, and covers what makes a home "colonial" style. He covers everything; the Early American Saltbox, Georgian, Dutch Colonial, French Colonial, Federal and Adams style, Classical Revival, and Post WWII Colonials - even the differences between northern and southern colonials.
Chapter 2 is about remodeling an existing house. What types of additions work when you need to expand? Do you really need to expand at all? What are the planning and zoning considerations? He mentions the difficulties involved in getting the vaulted ceiling look, especially on the first floor since most colonials have two stories.
Chapter 3 deals with renovating an older colonial. There are special considerations for colonial homes that were built in the 17th and 18th centuries, such as how to hide the wiring or how to create a 21st century bathroom. There are different problems involved for someone trying to renovate a colonial home that was built in the 1950's. One interesting example shows a saltbox house believed to have been originally built in 1694. The owners were attempting to undo a series of previous renovations that had occurred over the years and, in the process, made some very interesting archaeological discoveries about their home which they have done their best to preserve.
Chapter 4 is for the intrepid soul who is building a new colonial home. You have a lot more freedom in the design when you're starting from the ground up.
Chapter 5 is entitled "A Fresh Perspective." It includes such informative subheadings as, "This is not your father's colonial" and "A new sensibility." If you're a traditionalist, take that as a warning. However, you don't have to be as "out there" with changes to your own colonial home and there is a lot of good basic information in this book.
Colonials:Design Ideas for Renovating, Remodeling, and Building New (Updating Classic America).......2006-07-10
Great inspirations and pictures that are very helpful.
Great Idea Book.......2006-06-04
Colonial style homes have been built since -- well you can guess when. Modern colonials are built to suit modern taste. That is, the kitchens are large, there is a lot of storage space, it has a multiple car garage.
But if you have or are buying an older home, it may well not have all of these modern features. This book is a picture book with a fair amount of text showing how some colonial homes have been made more contemporary in the inside without changing the classic colonial front appearance. In many cases there are additions at the rear of the house to give the desired additional room.
Some of the houses being updated really go back a while, the earliest I noted was built in 1741. The level of remodelling/updating varies from house to house, some are really extensive, some done within a smaller budget. There's even a section on building a new colonial home.
I found this to be a great idea book.
Not a book for historical taste.......2004-02-10
Readers interested in historically authentic renovations or new construction of colonial, federal or classical revival style houses will not find much of interest in this book. The houses and furnishings pictured for the most part present eclectic blends of contemporary and historic styles. I would describe many of the "colonials" pictured in the book as postmodern eclectic. A number bear no recognizable relation to the colonial style.
The text is typical of what you would see in popular shelter magazines like Southern Living or House Beautiful: pleasant, generally informative and upbeat but not very detailed, and of little interest to more advanced readers.
One should examine this book in a store rather than buying it online, because the content suggested in the title is not what the book contains.
Customer Reviews:
Brag book.......2006-07-03
While there were several photographs of murals in different stages, most were not done sequentially with step by step instructions. There were good hints for painting effects. Overall, I found it to be the author's brag book with mostly photographs of their completed murals.
Painting Murals.......2006-07-01
I have owned this book for several years. I have loaned it out, and purchased it many times for artist friends that want ideas or to start painting murals. If not complete, it has wonderful pictures and lovely step-by-step photos that make it a gem of a book.
good book for beginners.......2006-01-25
Great beginner book but found more inciteful info at http://www.creativeevolution.net
Free online tutorials and video to view.
Helpful for beginning muralists!.......2002-07-23
Easy to grasp book on the subject of murals. I was inspired to attempt some for our house and had success. Author's discussion of materials especially helpful.
A+ addition for Beginner and Pro Faux painter.......2000-03-22
Alot of inspiration for faux painters w/how-to introduction for beginners. Discusses composition, hightlights, shadows, perspective and how to transfer large scale drawings. Sets out several projects and gives you materials list, and instructions to complete projects. Also includes a multitude of pictures for ideas. I used this book when I began and still use it for inspiration. I also give to my clients to look through for ideas. Although it mainly discusses interior murals, it does have a chapter that takes you through execution of an exterior mural & several ext. mural ideas. The only fault: Doesn't talk about finishing or sealing, or whether it's needed, but still a keeper.
Books:
- Designed to Sell: Make any home the hottest property on the block with expert advice from the popular HGTV series
- Digital Drawing for Designers: A Visual Guide to AutoCAD
- Distillation Operation
- Education (The "Feng Shui Fundamentals" Series)
- Encyclopedia Judaica 22 Volume Set
- Encyclopedia of Herbal Medicine: The Definitive Home Reference Guide to 550 Key Herbs with all their Uses as Remedies for Common Ailments
- Encyclopedia of Native American Bows, Arrows & Quivers: Volume 1: Northeast, Southeast, and Midwest
- Every Man's Battle: Winning the War on Sexual Temptation One Victory at a Time (The Every Man Series)
- Felt to Stitch: Creative Felting for Textile Artists
- Floorcloth Magic: How to Paint Canvas Rugs for Decorative Home Use
Books Index
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General
| Interior Design
| Architecture
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
The New Smart Approach to Home Decorating (New Smart Approach)
Color Schemes Made Easy (Better Homes & Gardens)
Trim Idea Book
Use What You Have Decorating : Transform Your Home in One Hour With Ten Simple Design Principles -- Using the Space You Have, the Things You Like, the Budget You Choose
The Color Scheme Bible: Inspirational Palettes for Designing Home Interiors
